The major goal of our type III transitional COBRE is to provide state of the art genomic and transgenic core services to the Brown University community and affiliated centers in the Northeast while preparing to transition to independent support in the next five years. The scientific theme of the Center developed with type II COBRE support was cancer signaling networks. This general scientific theme will be continued but we as a center are poised to provide the research infrastructure for a wider range of scientific projects than were supported initially in the type II COBRE. The pilot project mechanism associated with the type III COBRE will be used to nucleate collaborative efforts by groups of faculty focusing on significant scientific problems that can immediately translate into multi-PI and/or program project applications. The research cores originally proposed were Mouse Transgenics, Imaging, Genomics and Bioinformatics. The first three carried over from the type I COBRE while the latter was established as a new core facility. The Bioinformatics core was only briefly supported by the type II COBRE as it evolved into an independent center (Center for Computational Molecular Biology). The Imaging core was also graduated from COBRE support and now functions as an independent facility. The imaging core has grown exponentially and is a major resource for investigators at Brown and in the state. We have a track record of using COBRE resources to develop solid research cores whose scientific focus allows them to achieve independence from this mechanism. Our remaining two cores for which we are requesting support are quickly becoming more heavily relied on by the scientific community here in Rhode Island. We will continue to improve these cores to the point where they can be independently supported by a combination of user fees, individual and program-type grant support, and University cost-sharing when needed.